“Science in the National Interest:" House Science Committee Hearing
An August 4 hearing of the House science subcommittee examined the strengths and weaknesses of the Administration’s just-released report, “Science in the National Interest.” The report (see FYIs #120 and 121) represents the first articulation of U.S. science policy in the post-Cold War era. One of the main voices for science on Capitol Hill, full committee chairman George Brown (D-California), opened the hearing by calling the report “a thoughtful re-examination of the nation’s science policy” that “leaves no doubt about the critical role which fundamental research must play.” He also commended the document for addressing issues of international collaboration, renovation of the science infrastructure, multi-year budgeting, diversity in science, and peer review. “The hard part,” he said, “will be to translate the broad goals and rhetoric of this report into concrete policies, actions and funding levels.”
Presidential Science Advisor Jack Gibbons pointed out that U.S. R&D funding, both public and private, defense and civilian, is approximately 2.6 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP), compared to an investment in civilian research of 3 percent for Japan and 2.5 percent for Germany. He suggested that an increase to 3 percent might be “a reasonable long-term goal.”
While Brown commented that the report and Gibbons’ testimony “inspire me to optimism,” he questioned the feasibility of increasing the fraction of the GDP allocated to research. Taking into account inflation, growth of the GDP, and reductions in defense funding, Brown estimated that civilian R&D would have to grow nearly 80 percent to reach the 3 percent of GDP goal, although industry-sponsored research is currently decreasing. Gibbons replied that the Administration was trying to improve the “seed ground” to encourage more private sector investment in research. He said the report was intended to spell out a philosophy, not be “a budget document.”
A second panel of witnesses from academia and industry offered opinions on the report. Lehigh University president Peter Likens, while praising it for capturing the consensus of the science policy community, argued that the report downplays the political difficulties of increasing research spending by assuming “robust growth in national prosperity.” He also noted that it “provides very little help to those whose obligation is to prioritize among worthy candidates for investment.” Kumar Patel, vice chancellor of research for UCLA, said the report did not adequately address the question of how much basic science is enough, although the goal of keeping the U.S. in the forefront of all areas of research could be used as a guide. Patel and Likens agreed that international comparisons of GDP percentage can be misleading because countries have different combinations of manufacturing, health, defense, agriculture, and service industries.
Subcommittee chairman Rick Boucher (D-Virginia), noting the freeze in discretionary funding and reductions in defense spending, said he would consider it “a victory” if the total federal R&D investment remained constant in future years. He asked whether an infrastructure improvement program was important enough to cut into the research budget. Several witnesses responded that if it did, the emphasis should be on renovating existing facilities rather than building new ones.
